It’s about 8 AM, which means I’ve been on the road for (hopefully) an hour already. I meant to get this out earlier in the month, but life got in the way. So…

NECON is this week (YAY!), which means THE SMILE FACTORY will formally debut on Friday evening at the Meet the Authors event (DOUBLE YAY!). Informally, however, you can probably order a copy now on Amazon if you can’t make it to the conference or if you were unable to pre-order a signed copy last month. Speaking of pre-orders, they’re all packaged and ready for mailing next Monday when I return from Rhode Island (probably with a hangover).

I’ll have more detailed news soon (Final Rec in paperback (!), Moon Hill in paperback (!!!), another unannounced Precipice paperback project(???)). In the meantime, be good to each other, and try not to burn the place down while I’m gone.

A couple of years ago, during one of the many Geeky Writers broadcasts, my good friend Eryk Pruitt mentioned a local cold case he’d been researching. He’d mention it every time we spoke–new evidence, meeting with the victims’ families, discussing case details with the local police–and over time I began to see my friend’s passion for not just researching this particularly dark part of North Carolina history, but for bringing justice to the victims and their families after nearly 50 years.

After two years of long drives and sleepless nights, the fruit of Eryk’s labors have been unveiled: an eight-episode podcast titled THE LONG DANCE.

From the website:

On February 12, 1971, in Durham, North Carolina, a 20-year-old nursing student and her 19-year-old boyfriend left a Valentine’s Dance to park down a secluded lover’s lane. They never returned. Two weeks later, their bodies were found deep within the Carolina pines. They had been strangled, tortured, and murdered. Their murders have never been solved.

THE LONG DANCE is the story of the lives touched by the murders of Patricia Mann and Jesse McBane. Produced by crime fiction author Eryk Pruitt, investigative reporter Drew Adamek, and sound engineer Piper Kessler, it uses recorded interviews to tell the tragic tale of North Carolina’s most baffling murder case.

In creating THE LONG DANCE, we had a very simple goal: To create the substantive record about the lives and deaths of Patricia Mann and Jesse McBane, as well as the forty-six year investigation into their murder, and the stories of those people touched by their deaths.

Not only were we fortunate enough to record several hundreds of hours of interviews with our subjects, but we also became active participants in the investigation by helping to secure the DNA profiles of the three suspects who had never been eliminated. We have partnered with the Orange County Sheriff’s Office who believes this may be the final chance to close the book on the forty-six year old murder case.

THE LONG DANCE is the result of Eryk’s journey, because it became more than just research to him, more than just an investigation. This was his journey into the heart of a crime writer’s true passion and, dare I say, true purpose: to shed light on the vermin who prey in the shadows so that they may not hide.

Eryk Pruitt

Drew Adamek

Piper Kessler

Mike Rollin

If you’re at all interested in true crime, I urge you to listen to the eight episodes of this podcast. Share with your friends. Throw some support to my friend Eryk and his team. They’ve more than earned it.

Click here for THE LONG DANCE website, where all eight episodes are available. The podcast is also available for free on iTunes, Stitcher, iHeartRadio, Google, and wherever else you get your podcast fix.

THE SMILE FACTORY will debut this summer at NECON, with an official “on sale” date of 7/24/18. Thing is, not everyone can make it to NECON (seriously, it’s already sold out), so I’ve decided to offer signed copies of the chapbook for sale.

The pre-order window will be limited to just two weeks this time around. I expect the books will take about two weeks to be delivered, and I need to ensure I get them in time before I leave for NECON in mid-July. Any copies leftover from the conference will be made available in the shop at a later date.

I think that’s about it. Any questions, drop me a line here or ask me on social media.

I’m a bit busy at the moment with other projects, but I wanted to take a moment to say that I had a blast at Spring House Brewery this past Saturday. I joined fellow authors Somer Canon & her husband Jessie (who is a bad movie–inside joke), Armand Rosamilia & his wife Shelly, Chuck Buda, Tim Meyer, Frank Edler, JC Walsh and his wife Colleen, and Jay Wilburn for the kickoff of the 2018 Beers & Fears tour. We drank some beer (their Mango IPA is excellent), sold some books, and had a blast hanging out with one another. Here are some photographic highlights:

Beers & Fears 2018 !

Me & Chuck

Me & Jay

JC & Frank strike a pose.

Me & Armand.

Me & Tim, slightly drunk.

Frank & Armand

That’s about it for now. I’ll have more on-sale info for THE SMILE FACTORY sometime next week.

Well, after more than a decade, I finally wrote a story about my day job. And it’s a weird one, folks. Really weird. Probably the first story of mine that I’d actually consider 100% weird fiction, with a hint of cosmic and bizarro thrown in for good measure.

This story will be printed as a limited run chapbook and will debut at NECON 38 this July. I’ve already received questions about availability for sale online, and for now, I’m hesitant to commit to anything beyond this chapbook run. I’ll be doing this through Precipice (our first release since Rapino’s Moon Hill in 2016).

I’ve never done a formal chapbook before, but after collecting/reading the offerings of Jon Padgett, Barry Lee Desaju, Catherine Grant, Cat Scully, and Bracken MacLeod over the last several months, I’m eager to try this format.

Here’s the cover:

The story is approximately 9k words and will run about 30 pages or so. I’ll have more info as we get closer to NECON.

I’ll be at Spring House Brewing on Saturday, May 12th along with Armand Rosamilia, Somer Canon, Tim Meyer, Chuck Buda, and Frank Edler for the first stop of the Beers & Fears 2018 tour. If you’re in the Reading/Lancaster/York area, join us for beers, talk horror, and buy a book or five!

The weekend came and went, and so did the signing event at my local B&N. I had a great time, met some great authors, and sold a lot of books. I had to replenish stock of ULT halfway through the first day, and by the end, there were only six copies left in the store. I’d call that a success. I’ve already said this on social media, but I’ll say it again here: Thanks to everyone for coming out and showing your support. It means the world to me.